Favorites

A couple of favorites are on my mind today:  columnist and author.

Today's NYT column by Paul Krugman, Wall Street Whitewash, reminds me why he's my favorite.  Succinct, concrete, significant, and insighful, it's all one needs for a bird's eye view of how dysfunctional our political system has become thanks to one party's tactical dishonesty in thrall to misguided, gormless ideology.  (Yeah, I really wanted to use "gormless" in a sentence.  In fact, this blog exists mainly so I can do that sort of thing.  No, I don't care to discuss what I mean by "that sort of thing.")

Speaking of gormless (sorry), one more thing to add re the tax cut bill that just passed.  I'm worried - seriously worried - that the one-year payroll tax holiday will be reenshrined for another year when it nears its expiration date.  Lotsa commentators have pointed out the danger to Social Security As We Know It (SSAWKI) if it's starved of its payroll tax funding.  Privatization through IRAs of Social Security: Operating on the Nation's Unwary Suckers (PISSONUS).  I'd like to think that Congress will have the guts next year to say, "We said one year only, and we meant it."  I'd also like to have an indoor, free of charge, regulation golf course inside my condo that I can play whenever I want without having to wait. 

I'm on a quest to identify a new favorite living author.  I've been on it ever since David Foster Wallace bit the dust.  My pre-DFW fave was William Trevor.  Fools of Fortune, The Silence In The Garden,  Miss Gomez and the Brethren are spectacular, as are most of his other novels.  What short stories of his I've read are equally well crafted, and I've enjoyed them in spite of not particularly caring for that form.  The dude writes beautifully, almost, it seems, effortlessly, the plots and characters seeming to live within the words themselves.  He's still alive, so I could revert.  But there's a problem: I've been spoiled by DFW's amazing breadth of interest and form.  Novels, short and not-so-short stories, novellas, essays, journalistic forays, mathematics (Everything and More: A Compact History of Infinity - the only book of his I haven't read, but I will).  All written in an original voice - informal/ post-modern, somewhat ironic) I dig and laced with humor and insight into themes beyond the story at hand.  I'm in awe of some contemporary writers' skill with words (thinking here of Cormac McCarthy), but not only are their works limited to novels and short stories, they tend to center their writing along the same themes, book to book.  Annie Dillard comes to mind, but her first novel, The Living, was no more than mediocre.    The last book of hers I read, For the Time Being, was provocative, I suppose, but it seemed more high level shtick than what it aspired to - serious engagement with timeless issues.   I think she's peaked.   Any suggestions?

As long as I'm on books, I'll mention Tod Wodicka's All Shall Be Well; and All Shall Be Well; and All Manner of Things Shall Be Well.  I almost loved it.  Exceptional dialogue, interesting story, and lotsa room for debate as to motivation and meaning.  It's difficult to believe it's a first novel.  In fact, so far it's an only novel.  If your book group's looking for something new and off the beaten path, you'll be happy with it.